Yabloko to lose its last regional seats, as a fifth region moves to keep the party off the ballot

The Pskov Regional Court struck Yabloko’s party list from the ballot for the region’s legislative elections. The court found that the seal on the authorization form the party first submitted to the election commission was missing required information.

The Rodina party demanded Yabloko’s removal. Acting on a lawsuit from Rodina, Russia’s Supreme Court struck Yabloko’s federal list from elections to the State Duma — Russia’s lower house of parliament — on August 10.

The Pskov region is the fifth where officials have tried to keep Yabloko off the ballot for regional parliament elections, the party said. Yabloko’s list was previously removed from elections in St. Petersburg, the Leningrad region and Karelia. In the Kaliningrad region, the Communists of Russia party (not to be confused with the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, or KPRF) is seeking to remove Yabloko.

For now, Yabloko candidates are still running in regional campaigns in the Kaliningrad, Novgorod, Pskov, Sverdlovsk and Tomsk regions.

The Pskov region is the only one where Yabloko holds seats in the regional parliament. It is also the home region of the party’s deputy chairman, Lev Shlosberg. On August 17, a court sentenced him to 11 years in prison on charges of repeatedly “discrediting” the army and spreading “fake news” about the military. Shlosberg was convicted of publicly expressing an anti-war stance.